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NEW YORK – Craig Berube likes using Sean Couturier's line to shut down the opponent's top trio. He's done it all year and has tried to get that matchup whenever possible.

On the road, where the Flyers are for the first two games of their Eastern Conference first-round playoff series against the New York Rangers, favorable matchups are hard to come by.

Rangers coach Alain Vigneault has a different method. He put his own top line of Derek Stepan, Rick Nash and Martin St. Louis against the Flyers' best trio of Claude Giroux, Scott Hartnell and Jake Voracek. So far, it seems to be working.

"Stepan is really good defensively, and with their top [defense pairing] it's tough to get much going," Hartnell said. "You can see when you get on the body and create turnovers you're going to get chances. We did get some shots, but they were either getting blocked or missing the net and it goes back the other way. So we have to find some way to get some offensive zone pressure and keep it on them."

Hartnell had the only two shots among his trio Thursday night, and he fed Andrew MacDonald for the Flyers' lone goal. He went into the corner, hit Ryan McDonagh to create a turnover and dished the puck to MacDonald.

That was the best-designed play the Flyers had all night. Otherwise, they just couldn't get anything going. Berube thought the way to go was chipping the puck behind the Rangers' defense and chasing after it.

After a game in which his team only registered 15 shots, he wants to continue with that plan rather than trying to carry the puck into the Rangers' end.

"Teams have traps, and you have to read it," Berube said. "But if we make better plays coming out of our end, we will carry the puck more. But we didn't make good enough plays coming out of our end. We had no choice but putting in deep because we didn't have numbers on the rush."

If the Flyers are going to have a shot at winning the series, they'll have to get Giroux's line going. The captain finished the season on a torrid pace, with seven points in the final four regular-season games. That put him in third place in the league in scoring with 86 points.

Through one game against the Rangers, who have given the Flyers fits, Giroux barely had the puck on his stick, and that means the whole line suffers.

"I think we need a little bit more composure with the puck," Hartnell said. "When we get it, we just kind of looked to give it away instead of creating some battles. G and myself, we can win a lot of those battles, but we haven't really been in position to support each other and whatnot. When we talked about it after the game, we definitely could play a lot better, and we need to play a lot better to have success."

After spending most of the first 40 minutes of Game 1 in their own zone, the Flyers took a lot of penalties in the third period. Once Jason Akeson's four-minute high-sticking penalty yielded two Rangers goals, they were toast.

According to Berube, fatigue is not a factor.

"No I don't [think so] at all," the coach said. "[Thursday] night going in to the third period, I thought things were good until that penalty. We need to do a better job of killing that penalty. The four-minute minor there, that hurt. But going into that we were in good shape."

The Flyers now have a 4-10 record in the first games of playoff series since 2006. On four occasions, they've come back to win the series.

"If you look at our team, I think we'll play a lot better [Sunday]," Hartnell said.

"You've got to give them credit, they were ready to go. But you're going to see a different attitude and mindset from us in Game 2."